The Wanderer: The Story of Rhaego
by monsterXmash
Summary: The Dothraki prophetess has a startling vision of a man who was said to have died in the womb. She leaves the khalasar and searches for him in hopes of not only saving Vaes Dothrak but conquering the Seven Kingdoms. ::: Rhaego/OFC :::
1. Where is the horse gone?

**The Wanderer**

Chapter 1: _Where is the horse gone?_

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><p><em>The Dothraki prophetess has a startling vision of a man who was said to have died in the womb. She leaves the khalasar and searches for him in hopes of not only saving Vaes Dothrak but conquering the Seven Kingdoms. ::: RhaegoOFC_

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><em>This was inspired by the Old-English poem, _The Wanderer_, with each chapter title being a line from it. I suggest reading the poem and I also suggest reading this fic, too! I hope you like it. Enjoy and review!

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><p>The flap of his tent opened, allowing the light to stream in for only a moment, but the Khal did not have to look up to see who had entered. It had been a long time since her last visit, but the metallic chime of her golden anklets was a familiar sound to his ears. The Khal did not stand to greet the woman, did not turn to her as she walked behind him to where he was settled. He continued sitting cross-legged on the pillows, staring into the fire infront of him.<p>

"I come humble before you," the visitor said as she stood on the opposite side of the fire, the common acknowledgement spoken if one ever happened to stand above her Khal.

"Sit," Drogo commanded, still not looking at the woman. His posture was straight and stiff as always, his shoulders broader than she remembered, his hair longer, his eyes more weary.

"Miiqa, do visions no longer plague you?" the Khal asked after she sat on her knees in front of him. He stared at her over the fire, the glow of the flames illuminating her copper skin.

"They do," she admitted to him and looked away. She meant to speak no more about her visions to the Khal, especially the ones that have been tormenting her of late. The last time she read the fire it was of the girl he would marry, who was now the Khaleesi and pregnant with his child.

"Why have you not come to me with them?"

"You have not sent for me," she reminded him.

"Never did I have to before," he said.

The woman looked back up at her Khal. "Many things have changed since then."

He said nothing in reply but continued staring at Miiqa, burning eyes reflecting the flames that separated them. She did not submit nor back down. She did not lower her eyes nor bow her head. And why should she? She never had before.

"Show me what you see," he finally said to her, and placed his hands on his knees, waiting.

The prophetess stood obediently with a soft sigh and looked down into the flame. Gingerly, she opened the pouch at her hip and grabbed a handful of black powder. She sifted the powder between her hands and then threw it into the fire. The flames roared and rose up, immediately heating the already scorching tent. Miiqa stretched out her arms and turned her black stained palms to the flame.

"The Khaleesi will give birth to a dragon," she declared as the blaze turned itself into a winged monster, red and orange and white. The inflamed dragon licked at her palms and when she was certain that the image could hold on its own, she put her hands down at her sides. They both watched the strange creature intently as it danced through dry air; Khal Drogo with fascination, Miiqa with despair.

"Forged from fire, it will be, suckled on blood - fed from the screams of our people."

The dragon changed to a wailing woman, hands pulling at her blazing hair, mouth opened in anguish. The Khal could almost hear her cries in the crackling fire. Miiqa's hands came up and she cupped her own sweaty cheeks, closing her eyes with the same misery as the fire woman. Slowly, her hands left her face, smearing the black powder across her flesh.

"The khalasars will burn. Vaes Dothrak will burn. And with it, our whole nation will burn."

She lifted her arms and the flames rose up even higher, far above her head, almost touching the top of the tent, then quickly extinguished, an ominous harbinger of things to come. The smoke rose thickly from the pyre.

Miiqa brought her hands back down, breath ragged as she waited for the Khal to speak. She could read many things, but it was always so hard to read him. The tent was silent, the bustle of the people outside barely heard by the two. At that moment it was only them - the Khal and the prophetess as they once were.

"You lie," Khal Drogo finally said.

"You know this to be true. Or else you would not have called on me."

She had been his counsel for years; the woman who rode alongside the Khal, in front of even the bloodriders. Not Khaleesi, but lover and famed prophetess who had help him amass countless victories and treasures.

"You lie!" he repeated even louder. "She will birth a stallion! My son!"

"She will birth no babe, Drogo," the woman told him. The Khal narrowed his eyes at her, displeased at the informal use of his name. That is what she had always called him, but it had been so long. He wished he did not think so, but the sound was sweet coming from her tongue. This feeling angered him even more.

Quickly he stood and stepped over the smoking pit. He took the woman by her shoulders roughly, almost picking her up in his ferocity. "She will give birth to a stallion. The stallion that will mount the world!" he growled, shaking the woman until she managed to push him away from her.

"If a stallion is what you say, then a stallion is what it will be," she said humbly but unconvinced, slightly shaken from the sudden assault.

The Khal turned from her and stood almost motionless, but she could see his hands tensing into fists as he considered her words. "What would you have me do?" he finally asked.

Miiqa but a palm on his back. The feeling of his flesh was was warm, inviting, familiar. "You know the answer, my Khal," she whispered.

He looked over his shoulder fiercely, his long hair swaying, and she quickly removed her hand from his back. "You would have me kill my wife? You see her death as your gain!"

Miiqa backed up a few steps as though his words struck her. The Khal turned to face the prophetess. "Do not mistake me for a jealous whore, Drogo! I am neither," she roared. The man stayed emotionless, allowing Miiqa to calm herself. "You trusted me once, completely. Was it not I who put braids and bells in your hair?" She reached up and stroked the loose tresses that fell down his back like waves in the wind-blown Dothraki sea. "Was it not I who you called in times of need? In times of want? I have never lead you astray, Drogo. And I never will."

The words she spoke were true. She was the love of his youth - and was she not once as the sun warming earth? He had defied his father when he told him not to seek out the guidance of the child prophetess, but he was a curious boy, a novice Khal, stubborn and unmoving. That very night was the first of many spent in a tangled heap of silvery silken sheets; a curious acquirement, but Miiqa came to learn that the new Khal was a collector of the exotic and the very beautiful. They made love in a way that only the Dothraki could appreciate while drunk on spiced wine and blithe prophecies.

When she first saw the Khaleesi, her hair reminded the prophetess of her former lover's old silken sheets. "You had a mind once to marry me," the woman said, trying to clear her head of the thought.

"We were young then," he told her, and he too spoke the truth. At that time,the young prophetess had barely seen a dozen dry seasons, and the boy Khal, only a half dozen more than her.

"As young as your child bride?" she said. The Khal leered at the woman through thick eyebrows and she looked down, ashamed at her brash words. "These are your people," she continued, still staring down at the animal-hide floor of the tent. "These are my people. They are not hers." She looked back up at her Khal, a new sense of conviction and passion present in her voice. "They will turn from the Khaleesi and she will seek her vengeance."

"This will not happen. Not while I still live."

Miiqa put a soft hand to the Khal's face, cupping his jaw as she had so many times before. She said nothing to him, but her expression told all.

"What will happen then?" the man asked. "What of my son? The stallion? Where is the horse gone?"

"Where no horse may graze, nor man walk," she said and the Khal could not reply.

Miiqa regarded Drogo sadly, then departed from his tent, leaving him staring into the embers of the extinguished fire. Tomorrow would be a new day and he would seek her out once more, she knew. He would urge her to look into the fire again, to find some flaw in the past reading, but none would be discovered. She walked out into the scorching sun, shading her eyes from the rays. The Khaleesi was returning as she left, smiling naively at the prophetess as they passed one another.

_Jalan atthirari anni_, she heard the Khal say to his wife after the tent flap swished closed.

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><p><strong>Please review!<strong>


	2. Where the rider?

**The Wanderer**

Chapter 2: _Where the rider?_

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><p>The whole town was ablaze, black clouds of smoke billowing densely into the otherwise clear blue sky. Statues tumbled from their pedestals, collapsing into naught but rubble on the hard, trampled ground. The stale scent of sweat and blood and burnt human flesh permeated through the valley, but the Dothraki were used to the smell. The screams of the Lhazareen people could still be heard as they were rounded up and brought from the debris; flocked together in pens as the sheep that they so cherished.<p>

Miiqa walked quickly through the crumbling village, not stopping to collect prize nor plunder as the others in the khalasar did. The possessions of the Lamb Men meant little to her and she was in no need of slaves. Instead, she walked straight and determined, looking ahead lest the fire that engulfed the buildings distract her from her task. She was searching desperately for her Khal, only stopping when she spotted his red stallion.

"I see his horse, but where the rider?" the woman said to one of the Khal's bloodriders. "Where is Drogo? Take me to him!"

"Be still," Haggo commanded. "What worries do you take to the Khal?"

Fire burned in the prophetess's eyes as she took a few more steps towards him. "Khal Drogo will want to hear the wisdom of his counsel," she said. In the past, the Khal would have had him whipped for keeping Miiqa waiting, but this was not then. Still, her words seemed urgent and was she she not the prophetess? Haggo knew not to deny the woman.

Drogo sat under the shade of a heavy canopy in front of the mud temple. He leaned forward against his bloodied arakh, idly turning the point into the dirt. He had slayed two Khals that day, and his hair was weighted heavy with tiny gold bells that rang with his every move. On one side of him were severed heads, stacked so tall that they dwarfed the sitting man. In front of him were two of his bloodriders, the third joining them as he lead Miiqa to her Khal.

The woman stepped under the shade of the canvas and bowed her head as she approached Drogo. He motioned her to come closer and she did, walking until she was right upon him. The prophetess took to one knee and held the Khal's hand in her own, kissing his dirty knuckles, a gesture of respect to counter her impending words.

"I came to you twice against my better judgement," she said, firmer than she planned. "Why seek my advice when you have no desire to follow it?"

Drogo pulled his hand back and glared down at the kneeling woman. "Who am I to take commands from you?"

"You are Khal Drogo," she said. "The undefeated horse lord, greater than all others. A man who has never before turned from my counsel."

Drogo considered her thoughtfully for a moment before commanding her to stand. She rose from her position in front of him, her golden anklets chiming as she did. The Khal took comfort in that familiar sound. "Come to my side," he told her.

Miiqa walked a few paces to stand beside his chair. They all stood quietly in the room - the Khal, the prophetess, and the three bloodriders. Outside the tent it was chaos, but inside only a fragile peace.

"You came to chastise me?" Drogo asked, not looking at the woman but out into the bright distance. The bloodrider Qotho turned his head slightly to look at the prophetess.

The woman did not have to bend to whisper in his ear, but merely turned, putting a hand on his bare shoulder as she spoke. "We must leave," she said quietly. "Turn from this village. Let the people go."

This time, he looked at her. "Why? Why must I do these things?"

"This will be our downfall," she said, staring into the Khal's dark eyes. "The beginning of the end."

Their contact broke only when the Khaleesi entered the shelter, taken in hand by Ser Jorah, and followed closely by her handmaids and _khas_. Behind the assembly came a group of woman slaves, looking destitute and downtrodden as they shuffled along. Daenerys stared hard at the two Dothraki. The prophetess was once Drogo's lover, she now knew, found out only days ago as she saw her leave the Khal's tent for the second time.

Before any words could be spoken, a mounted warrior rode up and jumped quickly out of his saddle. He walked furiously under the canvas before Haggo stopped him from advancing.

"I, Mago, who rides in the _khas _of Ko Jhaqo, have claimed many lives today for the _khalasar_," he practically yelled, unprompted. "But the Khaleesi has taken my spoils, a daughter of the lamb who was mine to mount!"

Everyone under the canopy looked at Daenerys. "Tell me the truth of this moon of my life," the Khal said, face hard and unmoving.

"Mago speaks the truth, my sun-and-stars," the girl told him, taking a few steps forward. "I claimed many women today, so they could not be mounted."

"This is the way of war," the Khal explained. He motioned to the huddled group behind the Khaleesi. "These women are our slaves now, to do with as we please."

"It pleases me to keep them safe," she said. "If your riders would mount them, let them be gentle and take them for wives."

The three bloodriders laughed before the Khaleesi could even finish her appeal. "Does the horse mate with the lamb?"

"The dragon feeds on horse and lamb alike," Daenerys spat.

"You are a foreigner," Mago growled. "You do not command me."

"I am Khaleesi. I do command you."

"See how fierce she grows?" Drogo asked, his chest puffed out with pride. "That is my son within her. The stallion who will mount the world," he said, risking a glance at the prophetess, "filling her with his fire." The Khal looked forward, sharing a quick look with his wife before he continued. "I will hear no more. Mago, find somewhere else to stick your cock."

The warrior spat on the ground in front of Drogo, and quickly, Jorah took Daenerys by the shoulders and lead her back. Even the quivering mass of slaves retreated.

"A Khal who takes orders from a foreign whore is no Khal," Mago said, holding his soiled arakh in front of him. While his bloodriders advanced on the man, Miiqa stayed by Drogo's side, unmoved by Mago's words.

Khal Drogo told his bloodriders to retreat.

"I will not have your body burned, " he said to Mago. "I will not give you that honor." The Khal stood and approached the man. Mago kept his arakh up, cutting into the flesh of the Khal's chest, but Drogo only pushed forward into it, deepening the wound. "The beetles will feed on your eyes. The worms will crawl through your lungs."

Mago swung his arakh twice, trying to catch the Khal in the throat, but he ducked both times and ended up between the warrior and Daenerys. He took the knives from he breetches and displayed them before dropping the weapons to the ground.

"The rain will fall on your rotting skin," he roared, "until nothing of you is left but bones."

"First you have to kill me!" Mago said as he attacked the man once more.

Drogo took the warrior's own arakh and slit his throat open. "I already have," he said as he reached through the wound and ripped out the man's tongue.

He threw the severed muscle on the tower of heads with a sound of disgust as he sat back in his seat. The Khaleesi broke free from Jorah's grasp and ran towards her lord husband. "My sun-and-stars is wounded," she said as she knelt in front of the man, the same as Miiqa had done not but minutes before. Drogo looked down at his bleeding chest.

"A scratch, moon of my life."

"Where are the healers?" Daenerys called.

"This is the bite of a fly," he said, slapping a hand against the wound.

"No man can stand before Khal Drogo," Miiqa assured the young Khaleesi, but the girl said nothing in return.

"I can help the Great Rider with his hurts," a woman's voice said from behind Daenerys. Miiqa looked beyond the girl and saw a squat sheep woman take a few steps forward. She was plain-faced and ragged, covered in dirt and blood from the battle that she took no part of.

"Come no further!" Miiqa commanded, her thundering voice almost surprising herself as Qotho put his arakh in front of the slave woman.

"The Khal needs no help from slaves who lie with sheep," Haggo spat.

Danerys lifted her hand. "She is mine," the Khaleesi said, addressing both of them. "Let her speak. Who are you?" she asked.

"I am Mirri Maz Duur," the woman said. "I am godswife of this temple."

"_Maegi_," Haggo growled, his hand restless on the hilt of his arakh. Miiqa, too, stood uneasy beside her Khal.

"I am a healer," Mirri Maz Duur said. "My mother was godswife before me, and taught me songs and spells and how to make sacred smokes and ointments. A moonsinger gifted me with her birthing songs, and a woman of your riders taught me the magics of grass and corn and horse."

A tense, contemplative silence filled the air.

"Kill the _maegi_," Miiqa said finally, her words mirroring the thoughts of the Dothraki bloodriders. The Khal stared at the prophetess, catching her eye and keeping her attention. Never had she been one who lusted for blood and now she called for the death of a simple slave. It was enough to make him reconsider sparing the lamb woman's life. Miiqa was the one to break their stare as she shouted for the Dothraki healers. "If it must be done, let it be by our herbwomen."

"Lamb, horse, or dragon - the wound must be washed and sewn, lest it fester," the godswife explained.

"Blood of my blood..." Qotho started, the flat side of his arakh still against the woman's chest.

"Do not do this thing," Miiqa whispered, putting a gentle hand on Drogo's shoulder. "My Khal..." she pleaded.

"_My sun and stars_," Daenerys said. "Allow the godswife to help you."


	3. Where the giver of treasure?

**The Wanderer**

Chapter 3: _Where the giver of treasure?_

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><p>That night, the prophetess had a dream.<p>

A thousand thousand years ago, the first man emerged from the depths of the Womb of the World, riding upon the back of the first horse.

The vast lake was bottomless; the water still and calm as Miiqa walked along the banks. The sun shone bright in the midday sky, though no other came to the pool to seek relief from the heat. As far out into the distance as she could see, the lush plain was empty as well.

Miiqa was wandering aimlessly; no discernible destination was ahead and for that, she was surrounded in some strange sense of peace. There was no movement. No wind blew the trees, no bird flew in the skies. The was no sound, save for her own slow footsteps on the grass and she wished to stay in sight of the Mother of Mountains forever.

In the silent distance, a horse neighed. Miiqa picked up her pace, walking steadily towards the sound until she broke into a fast sprint. Her dress billowed behind her, the golden gossamer blowing in the wind. The beast was just ahead, grazing upon the grass close to the lake. The blood red stallion looked familiar, and stared back at her with the same awareness.

The surface of the water broke, and a man rose from it, walking towards the edge until he spotted the woman. He stood tall and brazen, droplets of water clinging to his bare body as he glistened in the sun. He was lean and long-limbed; his skin as burnished bronze. His hair hung wet and loose down his back, like obsidian, so black it shone almost blue in the blazing light. His lips were full between a dark beard and mustachio.

Miiqa left the shore and waded up to her knees in the water until she reached the man. He was taller than she first realized, towering over her as she stared up at large lilac eyes, glittering like an amethyst ring that she once so admired in the Eastern Market.

Hesitantly, the woman reached her hand up and smoothed the wet hair down on his scalp. "I see you with a golden crown atop golden bells," she whispered to him, though he spoke no words in return.

Bronze and obsidian and amethyst and gold - the riches of the world; the wealth of the earth. But where the giver of treasure? Was this man born from the Womb of the World as the first man; sprung from the infinite depths to people the earth with his khalasar?

_Vezh fin saja rhaesheseres. _The stallion who mounts the world.

Miiqa attempted to withdraw her hand, but the man caught her wrist in his grasp, pulling her closer. She gasped at this sudden movement, water splashing around her legs as she stumbled forward into the man. He clutched the woman's shoulders, steadying her but keeping her against him, her breasts pressed against his naked stomach. She placed her hands on the man's waist, bracing herself as she regained her footing. Under her touch, his skin radiated a fevered heat despite the cool water around them.

The prophetess watched his face as he reached around her and unbraided the various plaits from her hair until it flowed in all its length down her back. His motions were gentle as he did this and after, he combed his fingers through the waving tresses. He then held the back of her head in his palms, massaging her scalp until she closed her eyes and lost herself in the pleasure of it.

Before long, the man stopped these movements, but kept his fingers on her flesh; stroking her neck, tracing the line of her jaw with his fingertips, caressing the fullness of her lips with his thumb. He leaned down and placed his own lips upon her brow, then moved further, planting small kisses on the tip of her nose and both cheeks.

He rose back to his full height, Miiqa's eyes never leaving the smooth plains of the man's face as he did. He placed his hands on her shoulders, then slid the thin straps of her dress down her arms until the garment dropped into the water around her knees. The man held her waist as she stepped out of the gossamer, allowing the saturated fabric to float away and sink into the depths of the lake.

She felt the length of the man grow firm against her bare stomach as she pressed into him. His rough hands wandered up her sides and seized her breasts in his hands. The man pinched and pulled her nipples until they were hard and taut, eliciting a ragged moan from Miiqa's parted lips.

Her hands clung to his arms, so strong and unyielding as she clutched them tightly in her grasp. The man ran his hands up her chest to his shoulders, then back down her arms where he held the prophetess's hands in his own. He stepped back and lead her farther into the water until the soft surface waves lapped at her breasts, but barely reached his own stomach. He took her by the hips and lifted her easily and slid into her with a slow thrust.

Miiqa wrapped her fingers in the thick hair at the nape of his neck as he retreated and sunk back into her again. Her mouth sought the sultry skin at the hollow of his throat, leaving the salty taste of sweat smeared across her lips. His pace quickened and his thrusts became harder and more shallow. The man growled in her ear each time he entered her, the sensual sound making her thighs quiver around his hips. Miiqa threw her head back, her ebony hair billowing down behind her as she tightened around him and with one final thrust she called out his name.

"Rhaego!"

-X-x-X-

Where the khalasar stopped, the land was dead and brown. Hooves and wheels unsettled the dirt, clouding the air with a thick layer of dust. The staunch scent of the baked earth was not unpleasant, but the cracked ground filled both people and horses with despair.

"Why do you ride back?" Miiqa asked of Haggo as he rode against the flow of the khalasar.

"The Khal fell from his horse," the man replied, giving no attempt to lower his voice. "I was commanded to retrieve the _maegi_." He spit on the dry ground and kicked his stallion, urging it to continue its trail through the masses.

The prophetess rode quickly in the opposite direction, towards the head of the assembly. A tent was already erected when she arrived, Ser Jorah standing vigil at the opening. Miiqa dismounted her mare in one swift motion and made to enter the shelter.

"Khaleesi will see only the godswife," the man said to her as he blocked the entrance.

"Talk goes from mouth the ear, all over the khalasar. Khal Drogo fell from his horse," Miiqa said as she instictively clutched the leather pouch at her hip. "Am I not of the Khal's counsel, making me counsel of the Khaleesi as well? I am needed," she continued and from inside the tent, Daenerys told the knight to let the woman through.

The Khal was laid upon his sleeping silks, eyes half opened, but unseeing. His face was pale and hollow, the fullness of his cheeks wasted away. His hair was free from its braid, golden bells piled by his side as the Khaleesi bathed him with cool water.

"He is very strong," Daenerys said, and Miiqa did not know whether the girl was speaking to her or Jorah or merely reassuring herself. She sponged Drogo's flesh anxiously. "No one understands how strong he is."

The knight pulled out his knife and kneeled down, slicing off the paste that had congealed on the Khal's chest and prying the chunks from his flesh. The putrid smell of decay filled Miiqa's nostrils as she turned away from the black and oozing wound.

"He will die tonight, Khaleesi," the prophetess said, voice soft to hide her anger. Why did Drogo not listen when she advised him to turn away from the village? Why did he not kill the maegi when he had the chance?

"He cannot. I will not let him," Daenerys said as she continued to wash the man.

"Even a queen does not have that power," Ser Jorah said as he stood over the girl. "We must go quickly, before he dies."

The Khaleesi stopped her ministrations and stared up at the knight. "Go? Where should we go?"

"To Pentos," he said. "We will hire a ship to take us back. But we must travel south first to Asshai -"

"Khaleesi must go to the Dosh Khaleen," Miiqa said. "As all others before her."

The girl stood awkwardly, her swollen belly making every movement difficult. She dropped the sponge in a bowl and wiped her wet hands on her vest. "Why should I flee? I am Khaleesi. I carry Rhaego inside of me. He will be Khal after Drogo."

"The Dothraki follow only the strong," Miiqa explained to her. "They followed Drogo for this strength and when he is gone, the kos will fight for his place and the khalasar will be no more."

Jorah frowned. "They will not want competition, Khaleesi. They will take the babe from your breast and leave him to the dogs."

Tears filled the girl's eyes as she held her belly. The prophetess wanted to assure her that everything would be alright; to not worry for herself nor the child but she did not have it in her to lie to the disheartened girl. Miiqa put gentle hands on the Khaleesi's shoulders and spoke softly and truly to her. "As their last duty to Drogo, the bloodriders will take you to Vaes Dothrak where you will join the Dosh Khaleen. Then, they will follow him into the night lands."

Mirra Maz Duur entered the tent swiftly, followed by Haggo and the other two bloodriders. The man in front shielded his nose from the smell of rot with an arm. Qotho dropped the godswife's wooden bureau as he spotted the blackened flesh that covered his Khal's chest.

"The wound has festered," the woman said.

Qotho let the bureau lay where it fell and approached the godswife. "This is your work, maegi," he said as he laid the back of his hand across the woman's cheek and sent her to the ground.

"No!" the Khaleesi screamed. "I will not have her harmed!"

Qotho turned to the girl. "No?" he said. "You say me _no_? Better you should pray we do not stake you out beside your maegi. You did this, as much as the other."

"This woman is still your Khaleesi," Miiqa said and Jorah drew his sword from its scabbard. "Even if only while the blood of your blood still lives."

Haggo advanced on his Dothraki brother and put a hand on his shoulder to stop him from any impending actions. "She is still our Khaleesi," the man repeated Miiqa's words.

"Your Khal will be gone by morning," Mirra Maz Duur said, as if challenging the men to do anything else. She had brought herself to her knees and was kneeling beside Drogo. "He is beyond healing."

Daenerys stifled a sob. "You must save him! You must know a way. Some way. Some magic -"

The tent grew silent, but restless. Miiqa squeezed her cherished pouch. Haggo took a step forward. Daenerys held her belly in both hands.

"There is a spell," the godswife finally said. "Some would say death is cleaner."

"Khaleesi, no," Miiqa urged. "Do not do this thing!"

"Do it," the girl commanded, ignoring the prophetess. "Save him."

"There is a price," the lamb woman said and glanced curiously at Miiqa. "Only death pays for life."

"My death," Daenerys sighed.

"Khaleesi -" Miiqa pleaded. Ser Jorah raised his sword as the bloodriders took a few more steps forward.

"No, not your death, Khaleesi. Bring me his horse."

"No!" Miiqa yelled, but Doreah stood and ran from the tent, fetching men to bring the Khal's red stallion and so they did. Rakharo led the beast into the tent, where it reared and struggled as it caught the scent of death. It took all of the Khaleesi's khas to restrain the horse, but even so, they begged the girl the girl to reconsider.

"Khaleesi, do not do this thing!" Rakharo fell to his knees and pleaded. "Let me kill the maegi."

"Kill her and you kill your Khal," Daenerys said firmly.

"This is blood magic," Miiqa said. "It is forbidden."

The Khaleesi turned calmly to the woman. "It angers you because _your_ magic is without worth," she said. "As are your words."

As if she did not notice this exchange, the godswife began chanting in a tongue that no other in the tent understood. Before anyone knew what had happened, the woman drew a knife across the stallion's throat, letting his blood flow in a sanguine rush over the Khal, also spraying the Khaleesi, Miiqa, and herself.

The horse screamed and shuddered, dropping to his knees as the prophetess did. She stroked the soft hairs of the beast as it died. The sandsilk walls were spotted with blood, as were the rugs underfoot.

"Burn it," Daenerys commanded and her khas removed the stallion from the tent. "Leave us," she said to the others and Miiqa stood without a word to retreat from the tent.

"We will leave," Qotho told her. "For now." He pointed his arakh at both the Khaleesi and the lamb woman. "But know this - the Khal's fate is your own."

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><p>Thank you <strong>Oberon Sexton<strong> and dear **Anon** for reviewing!


	4. Where are the seats at the feast?

**Rhaego will be in the next chapter, I promise!**

** Please review and leave your comments!**

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><p><strong>The Wanderer<strong>

Chapter 4: _Where are the seats at the feast?_

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><p>The Khaleesi's khas were all waiting dutifully outside the entrance of the tent. Miiqa stood amongst them, silent and tired. They had stood vigil all night, hoping for some news about the Khal or Khaleesi or their child, but none came. Only screams and whimpers from inside the tent, and when Jorah departed from the shelter, he said nothing to them.<p>

The khalasar was gone. The bodies of fallen warriors still littered the ground, the ones left too weary to collect and burn them just yet. Just over a dozen horses were walking over the scorched earth, searching for any small bites of dried grass that they could find. Only the most tattered tents remained, along with a few bedrolls.

Where there were once forty thousand Dothraki, no more than a hundred stayed. Pono was the first to name himself Khal the day before and thousands had packed up and followed him. Jhaqo did the same. The rest of the khalasar had slipped away in the night, littering the Dothraki sea with bands of misplaced warriors and stolen slaves. Some children were left, and the old. A few slaves lingered, along with the Khaleesi's khas and handmaids, Ser Jorah, Miiqa, and the maegi.

The godswife meant to walk passed them; to leave the tent with naught a word of explanation nor reassurance. She passed the prophetess without a glance, but Rakharo stopped her. "What of the Khal?" he asked.

"He yet lives," Mirri Maz Duur said, shading her eyes with a hand and looking forward into the empty distance. Smoke and dust was all that was left.

"And the Khaleesi?" the kha asked.

"She needs her rest."

Miiqa let out a silent sigh, but she was not relieved as she should have been. "Rhaego?" she asked the godswife.

That's when the maegi put down her hand and stared at the troop. Miiqa could have sworn that she saw the hint of a smile graze her flat face, but it was gone as quick as it came. "The baby was monstrous," she explained. "It came out blind, with leather wings. Its scaled flesh burned my hands as I held it, before it fell off." The woman showed her palms, ridged with dark red blisters. "Inside it, there was only graveworms."

Without another word, Mirri Maz Duur left the bewildered group. Miiqa said a small invocation for the departed prince. Baby Rhaego would be too young to ride into the night lands as the other Dothraki. He must be born again.

-X-x-X-

The maegi was bound hand and foot, sitting on the hard ground beneath the blazing sun. The Khaleesi's foragers had wandered off in search of any wood that they could use for Drogo's funeral pyre. Others gathered in small clusters, confused and waiting.

Miiqa approached Mirri Maz Duur slowly and cautiously, but the woman only smiled up at her as if she was not tied up and helpless. The prophetess kneeled down in front of her. "Why did you do it?" she asked. "Is your heart so black? So withered?"

"The Khaleesi asked for life," the maegi said. "She paid for life."

Miiqa shook her head. "She paid _with_ life," the woman explained. "But not the one you intended."

The godswife looked at her curiously, but continued. "The stallion who mounts the world will burn no cities now. His khalasar shall trample no nations into dust."

For the first time in her life, the prophetess smiled a broad, cruel smile. "He will," she told the woman. "With your help, he will. With your death. Only death pays for life, is that not what you said?"

"Nothing can be done," Mirri Maz Duur told her, but her voice did not have the same confident tone and her smile faltered.

Miiqa stood and hovered over the old godswife. "It is _already _done."

A shuffling was heard from behind the prophetess and she turned just as a stallion fell, blood flowing from a wound between its eyes. The Khal's red had met its fate in the tent, but this horse would leave the world with Drogo and carry him into the night lands.

"It is not enough to kill a horse," the old woman called to Daenerys. "By itself, the blood is nothing. You do not have the words to make a spell, nor the wisdom to find them. Do you think bloodmagic is a game for children? You call me a maegi as is it were a curse, but all it means is wise. You are a child, with a child's ignorance. Whatever you mean to do, it will not work. Loose me from these bonds and I will help you."

"She does not need your magic," Miiqa whispered to the woman with a silent smile and after that, the godswife kept quiet.

"We will dine on her heart!" Rakharo growled as he came to stand by Miiqa, baring his teeth as the godswife.

"It is black," the prophetess said once again. "And withered."

Hearing their words, Aggo approached them. "Where are the seats at the feast?" he asked.

Daenerys called what was left of the khalasar around her - the children, and the weak, and the old. Miiqa and the khas left the godswife and stood in front of their Khaleesi.

"You will be my Khalasar," the silver-haired queen told them. "I see the faces of slaves. I free you. Take off your collars. Go if you wish, no one shall harm you. If you stay, it will be as brothers and sisters, husbands and wives." As she said this, people started to scurry away, and behind the group, the maegi laughed. "I see the children, women, the wrinkled faces of the aged," Daenerys continued. "I was a child yesterday. Today I am a woman. Tomorrow I will be old. To each of you I say, give me your hands and your hearts, and there will be a place for you."

The girl turned to her khas. "Jhogo, to you I give the silver-handled whip that was my bride gift, and name you _ko_, and ask your oath, that you will live and die as blood of my blood, riding at my side to keep me safe from harm."

Jhogo took the whip from her hands, but his face was confused. "Khaleesi," he said with hesitation, "this is not done. It would shame me, to be bloodrider to a woman."

The Khaleesi ignored Jhogo's words, and instead she addressed the other two. To Aggo she gave her dragonbone bow and to Rakharo her arakh. To both she requested the same - that they ride with her as her _ko_. To be bloodriders to a Khaleesi.

"Miiqa," she said to the surprised prophetess, "to you I give the sword that was my bride gift, and name you my counsel, and ask your oath, that you will ride by my side and through your wisdom, you will keep the khalasar safe from harm."

Daenerys held out the sword and, though it was still in its scabbard, Miiqa could picture it well. It was presented to the Khaleesi on her wedding day. Its mirrored blade blazed with the light of the sun, though it was made of valyrian steel, dark as smoke. It was a sword befitting a king, but since that day it had been packed up, never before used, for Khal Drogo would only wield his arakh.

"I cannot take it, Khaleesi," Miiqa told her regretfully. "Fate calls me from across the Dothraki sea and I must answer. But you have my oath that I will do everything I can to help you on my journey."

The Khaleesi listened to her words, but handed her the sword anyway. "I shall hold you to that oath."


	5. Where are the revels in the hall?

**The Wanderer**

Chapter 5: _Where are the revels in the hall?_

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><p>Miiqa stood in front of the wooden tower, holding the glass jar of graveworms that she had collected from the floor of the Khaleesi's tent, and when Aggo had asked her why, she merely waved him off. No other needed to know that the contents of the jar was the last of the prince. But Mirri Maz Duur saw, and laughed. "What you are attempting to do is dangerous," the maegi said, as she was tied to a stake in the middle of Drogo's funeral pyre. "You are but a child. You haven't the capacity for great magic."<p>

Miiqa ignored her words.

The night air around them was thick with fragrance as oil was poured over the pyre, soaking the cushions and silks and logs. Drogo laid atop the upper most platform, his body saturated and glistening with the thick fluid. The Khaleesi's three dragon eggs were placed around him, black and green and gold and all hard as stone. The slayed stallion was placed beneath the platform, along with the warriors that had fallen when the khalasar split.

"This is insanity," Mirri said. She, too, was covered in oil, her hair and clothes dripping with it. "And you shall not hear me scream."

"It is not your screams I want," Daenerys told her, "only your life. I remember what you told me. Only death can pay for life."

The maegi made no reply. Twice that day, her words had been used against her. The woman closed her eyes and moved her lips in a silent prayer. Daenerys turned from her and took the torch from Jhogo's hands, setting fire to the logs herself. The flames caught quickly and spread. The wood crackled and splintered. Mirri Maz Duur began to chant a shrill song, her voice rising over the sound of burning brush in words that no other understood. Her song grew louder as the flames licked at her flesh, and her chants changed to agonizing screams that pierced the sky.

The smoke grew thick around them, and the Dothraki backed away. Miiqa herself turned from the fire, lest the flame charm her and hold her and show her things that she did not wish to see. She could hear the flames as they called to her, but nothing would be divined that night. She would not read the cruel fire that burned her Khal.

The prophetess turned back to the pyre with closed eyes and blindly tossed the jar into the flames. The heat would shatter the delicate glass. The graveworms would burn. And the maegi's death would pay for life.

"Do not mourn for Rhaego," Ser Jorah whispered as he stood beside Miiqa, watching the fire. "It was once said that with the birth of a new Targaryen, the gods would toss a silver coin to decide whether the child would be great... or mad." The prophetess stared silently at the mailed warrior. His pale eyes confessed his fatigue. "It is a misfortunate fate, but I fear that he would have been born into madness."

The curling smoke turned to black shadows that danced in the night sky, covering the stars until only one shone - a sanguine comet, blazing bright red; it's long tail streaking the darkness with blood.

Miiqa silently slipped away and readied her mount, a lean black mare given to her on her tenth name day. She had few valuables, all which were contained in a small wooden bureau - ampoules and amphoras and jars and vials, and as always, she carried her leather pouch at her hip.

Her own tent was a luxury that could not be sustained, so she bundled up one that was abandoned, along with her bedroll and other provisions for the journey. When her horse was laden with it all, she ascended the mare and rode away from the exhausted would follow the path of the bloodstar; not to where it was going but from whence it came. She would ride hard all night, and sleep during the day, avoiding the threats that lingered on the Dothraki sea.

-X-x-X-

_"Shieraki gori ha yeraan!" Miiqa called, and her words echoed back to her. _The stars are charging for you!_ "Rhaego! Rhaego! Watch the stars!" but no one answered._

_Torches covered the walls, setting the roofless hall aglow and drowning out the light of the stars above, but the chamber was abandoned. Dust covered the wooden tables, colorless spiderwebs gathered in the corners of the room, and a wrinkled, one-eyed crone stepped out from the shadows. With shaking limbs she approached the prophetess, her weight supported by a gnarled, wooden cane. This was the woman who had spoken for Rhaego, naming him the Stallion Who Will Mount the World when he was still in the Khaleesi's womb._

_"Where are the revels in the hall?" Miiqa called to her. "Where have the people gone?"_

_Slowly, the woman walked closer, her single black eye moist and reflecting the light. "Bring the stallion here," she said when she finally made it to the younger woman. "You will find it filled for your purpose."_

_"I have no purpose," Miiqa told her, but the crone only smiled a toothless grin._

_"Find the Stallion," replied the woman, "find your purpose." The ancient khaleesi began to walk again, past the prophetess, languidly making her way to the front of the room. Miiqa watched as she ascended the few stairs leading up to the dias. She took a seat amongst others that were empty and sat quietly. "Find the Stallion and bring him here."_

-X-x-X-

Miiqa awoke briskly from her fever dream, wiping at the now cool sweat that lingered on her forehead. She peered from behind the flap of her small tent, and saw only tall grass in front of her, but above, the sky was taking on a lavender hue, the setting sun casting a red glow against the otherwise pale sky.

The night before had passed without incident, as well as the following day while she slept, and once again Miiqa was riding alone on the Dothraki sea. The bloodstar guided her way, blushing bright overhead. She wondered if she was heading in the right direction, if intuition only was enough for this task, when she spotted the head of a great red stallion beyond the grass.

She rode quickly and came to a halt at the outside of the pasture. The woman dismounted her horse, leaving her things still strapped to it, and walked slowly towards a man sitting on a dirty white fur. He silently stared at Miiqa as she fell to her knees in front of him and took his face in her hands. His hair was long, ink black, and braided. His thick brow furrowed into a look of curious interest. His violet eyes glowed bright, reflecting the darkness like a nocturnal hunter as he looked down at her.

There was no mistaking it; this was the man from her dream. This was Rhaego and the horse was Drogo's red - both of whom had died at the hands of the maegi.

"Khal Rhaego," the prophetess whispered. "I come humble before you."

"Khal, you say?" the man asked with a small laugh, and Miiqa hesitantly removed her hands from his heated flesh. "Where, then, is my khalasar? I have lost it." His voice was like a drum - deep, hearty, and resonating as it flowed through the warm night air.

"I will bring you to your khalasar," the prophetess told him, confident in her words and her task.

The man nodded his head, trying to decide whether or not he would humor the woman. "And are you my Khaleesi?" he asked with a smile. Miiqa caught his condescending tone and stood from the ground so that she was hovering above him. "Do you have a name?" he continued when she did not reply.

"I am _not_ your Khaleesi," she said, but her knees quivered as she remembered her dream - their meeting in the crisp water in front of the Mother of Mountains. "I am Miiqa. I know - _knew_ - your mother and father." Rhaego's smile faltered and the woman took a few steps backward toward her horse. "But I do have something for you," she continued. Miiqa led her mare to where Rhaego was sitting and retrieved the gift given to her by Daenerys. She laid it across her palms to present it to the man.

"What is this?" he asked.

"A sword."

He looked at the prophetess skeptically. "What need do I have for a _sword_?"

"A great one, Rhaego. To get us where we are going."

The man scoffed and continued to sharpen his own weapon - a crude wooden spear, dark at the end where blood had permeated through its pores. Miiqa pulled the sword slowly from its scabbard and held it up in front of her with both hands.

"It is a sword made for a _king_," she said, the last word in the tongue of the Seven Kingdoms, one of the few that she did know. "It is better than a wooden spear. Mailed warriors say it is better even than an arakh, which you do not seem to have."

Rhaego looked at the dark blade, then bitterly back at the weapon in his hands. "Everything was lost in the fire," he mumbled without looking at her.

"Fire?"

"Yes!" he snapped, now staring at her fiercely. "Fire." He turned his attention back to his work, and scraped at the tip of his spear roughly with a knife. "I awoke in the night," he said, a curl of wood falling on the fur. "In the middle of a burnt field." Another piece fell. "I remember nothing that had come before."

Miiqa took to one knee, placing the sword on the ground beside her. She put a soft hand under the man's chin and gently tilted his head up so that she could look into his lilac eyes. "When, Rhaego?"

He stopped sharpening his spear and stared at the woman. She looked tired, and travel weary, but her dark eyes still danced with the youthful promise of something - _something..._

Maybe she did have the answers that he did not; the story of a life that he had forgotten. Rhaego sighed and smoothed back a loose strand of hair from Miiqa's face, so that he may gaze at her unhindered. "Last night," he told her, "as the bloodstar passed through the sky."


	6. Alas for the bright cup!

**The Wanderer**

Chapter 6: _Alas for the bright cup!_

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><p><em>"Read the cards."<em>

_"My Khal, you know -"_

_"Read the cards," Drogo repeated firmly. _

_"The cards are tricky! Their message is not always clear," Miiqa argued, though she began to remove the stack from its pouch. Drogo only stared at her, unmoved by her appeal. He would not tell her a third time._

_The day was warmer than usual, the heat seeping in through the sandsilk walls of the Khal's tent and surrounding the two. The Khaleesi was away as she was the day before, choosing rather to walk through the khalasar with her handmaids than spend the long hours in the stuffy makeshift shelter. Miiqa, too, wished she was outside, where the breeze could reach her moist skin and her Khal was not staring at her with hard, dark eyes. _

_She would read the cards, but Drogo would not listen. She read the fire the day passed, showing him what it showed her, but he paid it no heed. He would not accept it unless fate was in his favor, but the prophetess knew that the cards would not give him what he sought._

_Miiqa shuffled the stack between her hands and then placed four of the cards on the rug side by side. The painted pictures were all but faded, confessing their antiquity. Indeed, the cards had been in the woman's family for generations, her own mother teaching her how to wield them. _

_"What does it mean?" Drogo asked, looking at the images. Miiqa, too, stared at the quartet of cards - the Silver Chalice, the Mother, the Poison Water, the Meadow - and then began to speak._

"Behold the Silver Chalice,

The vessel in which life is contained.

Alas for the bright cup!

While she stays, nothing else shall remain.

After the loss and after the birth,

Fear death by earth."

_The man said nothing in response, so Miiqa continued. She pulled four more cards from the top of the stack and placed them ontop of the ones from before: the Khal, the Lover, the Ouroboros, the Westward Wind._

"Behold the Horse Lord,

The lover with a smothered heart.

Alas for the bravery of men!

For eras must end for others to start.

Sacrifice is a burden he shall bear.

Fear death by air."

_The prophetess gazed up at Drogo. His face was hard as a bronze shield, unwavering and illegible. "Do you want me to carry on?" she asked, but the Khal still said nothing. He only gave her a short nod, so she drew four more cards: the Eye of All Sight, the Dreamer, the Nightshadows, the Flame._

"Behold the Eye of All Sight,

The dreamer with the blood of the ancient.

Alas for those who seek the dawn!

The first to see the sun is her punishment.

When stuck in the shadows, thick as mire,

Fear death by fire."

_Miiqa did not pause this time, but drew the last set of cards with shaking hands and set them down: the Stallion, the Crown, the Sun, the Current._

"Behold the great Stallion,

The glorious hero when all is done.

Alas for the Khal, ruler of Kings!

The wanderer of every land under the sun.

Those opposed are bound for slaughter.

Fear death by water."

_-X-x-X-_

The land in front of them was black and burnt. Only ash and embers covered the plain where grass once grew; grass as tall as any man and every shade of color known to the human eye. Miiqa could picture it well in her mind, she could imagine the blades rippling like smooth waves in the wind, bowing to its power as the khalasar rode through it. But now there was nothing. All was black. And burnt.

The pair had traveled well into the day to reach the scorched steppe and the prophetess was exhausted. She had stopped to sleep once since her journey began, and that time was fitful - cluttered with dreams and surrounded by nightshadows. She longed for rest but would not admit to the man that she was weary.

"You think me fool enough to believe your story?" Rhaego asked once they had stopped.

"It is not my story," Miiqa told him as she dismounted from her horse. "It is yours."

The prophetess knelt down in the cinders and scooped handfuls of ash into an empty glass container from her bureau. She closed it tight when it was filled and once again stood, looking out into the horizon where black land met blue sky and she could not help but think that her world seemed bruised. The woman took a deep breath and the charred air filled her lungs, scratching at her throat so that she laid her fingers softly against the hollow between her collarbone.

Miiqa turned back to the man and caught him staring out into the same distance. "It is a hard thing to believe," she said, "that you are destined for a life greater than the one you are already living."

Rhaego stayed perched high above the woman on his stallion. His heavy brow shaded the radiance of his eyes, casting a shadow that grazed his cheekbones. He was solemn. Contemplative. On the cusp of accepting the impossible.

"You are saying I was born not but days ago?" he asked, looking down at the prophetess. "Already a man?"

She heard the masked sorrow in his voice and, for the first time, considered the curse of Rhaego's half life. Magic was wondrous, and fantastic, and miraculous, but it was also harsh and terrible. How cruel it was to give a man a bisected life, never able to be finished because of where it began. And how callous to expect so much from such a man.

"Yes," she replied. "You were forged from fire. If you do not believe me, then believe your eyes. There is no trace of any tents, nor bedrolls, nor bodies, nor caravans." She held on to the glass jar tighter. "Only ash. And you suppose you were the one left behind? Along with your horse?"

Rhaego's jaw clenched, but he said no words in return. The man took one last glance at the black stretch of earth, then back behind him at the tall grassland. He clutched the reigns of his horse, his fingers restless on the leather straps, until he finally turned his stallion to depart.

"If you leave," Miiqa called out to him, "your mother's pain was for nothing. Your father's death was for nothing." The man stopped, but did not turn back. "He knew his fate. He knew he had to die for you to live, and he accepted it. Do not let his death be in vain."

-X-x-X-

They had set up camp at the edge of the steppe, raising the one tent that Miiqa had brought and building a fire to chase away the evening chill. They sat across from each other, the blaze glowing between them, and Rhaego watched in astonishment as the flame took on the shape of two horses. They reared and frolicked with each other, the ignited beasts dancing in the night air.

"My eyes grow weary," Miiqa said as she stood and it was once again a normal fire.

"Wait," Rhaego called before she could enter the tent and he removed the Hrakkar pelt from across his saddle and handed it to the woman. Tentatively, she took it, then held the soft fur close to her chest as he spoke once again. "The night is cold," he said. "And you need all the sleep you can get before we reach Vaes Dothrak."

The woman nodded her head and entered the tent. She laid the fur down on her bedroll, then peered out a slit to the man outside. Rhaego had retrieved the sword and was clutching it in his hands. At first, he merely held it, admiring the dark valyrian blade and jade band that encircled the black leather grip. Then, he swiftly cut the sword through the air, making Miiqa jump in surprise. He gripped it tight in one hand as he would an arakh, kicking up ash as he moved just beyond the grassland. His long braid swung behind him as he fluidly sliced the night sky once again and Miiqa smiled.

How fierce he looked as he wielded the weapon. How graceful as he moved with the stars above his head. The prophetess could only imagine him riding into battle, his king's sword in one hand and khal's arakh in the other, an abundance of bells in his hair, the harbingers of his coming, as his enemies run away in fear.


End file.
